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In the weeks after Bobby's eighteenth birthday party, Warren waited for some kind of announcement. Scott and Jean had danced together -- Scott had actually asked Jean to dance -- and at some point, when Warren's back was turned (and it was all right -- he was over Jean -- he had his hands full with Candy Southern, and that was a good thing) the two of them had taken off together. A walk in the park, Jean had told Bobby, who had told Hank, who had told Warren.
The fallout seemed inevitable. Warren waited.
And he waited.
He didn't just wait, of course. Being an X-man didn't come with the luxury of downtime. There were battles, and when there weren't battles there was training, and when there wasn't training, there was course work – the Professor insisted they were going to come out of this with legitimate university degrees, although Warren was skeptical about what exactly they would be in. And when there wasn't any of that. . .well, Warren had started to claim he was going to visit family, and stay over at Candy's instead. And still, this was a good thing.
But with Scott and Jean, nothing seemed to change. They fought side-by-side, they occasionally worked out together, they borrowed each other's notes for class, they argued about whether Scott's favorite music was too boring, or Jean's was too loud.
The whole situation was extremely suspicious.
*
"So what's the deal with Scott and Jean?"
"I dunno," said Bobby. He was in the process of pouring out a box of Captain Crunch cereal, in pursuit of the iron-on "Star Wars" decal promised inside. "What's the deal with you and Candy?" As though that were remotely the same thing. "What's the deal with me and Zelda? What's the deal with Hank and Vera?" He pushed a handful of cereal into his mouth and mused, "Or is it the other way around?"
"I'm serious, Drake." Warren picked up a few pieces that Bobby had spilled. Chewing, he said, "This whole situation has major implications for the dynamics of the team."
"What situation?" Jean jogged into the room, wearing a sports bra, Spandex shorts and not much else. She approached Warren and continued running in place, ponytail bouncing against her neck, as she smacked the cereal out of his hand. "That sugary crap is so not on the training regime. Have you seen Hank? We're supposed to go running."
Before Warren could answer, Scott stumbled through the opposite door and groaned, "Coffee. Please, God, let there be coffee." Bobby helpfully proffered a mug that Warren had just poured for himself. Scott lifted the cup, chugged, and slammed it down on the counter. He then picked up the cereal that Bobby had poured and dumped it, plastic bowl and all, into the trash can.
"Hey!" Bobby protested.
"If I catch any of you eating junk like that again, you'll all be running suicide sprints in the Danger Room. Don't think I won't do it."
"Get up on the wrong side of the bed, Mr. Summers?" Jean asked. "Or just not sleeping well?"
"I never sleep well, Marvel Girl," he answered. "You know that. Going running?"
She tossed the ponytail over one shoulder. "Soon as I find Hank."
"He's shaving. I'll kick him out so I can use the shower. Your work ethic is commendable." He took a pointed look at Warren and Bobby – how did he even manage to do that when you couldn't see his eyes? – before turning on his heel and striding out of the room.
Bobby scrambled toward the trashcan and started digging for the cereal box. "I can't believe you're doing that," said Warren.
"C-3P0!" Bobby answered, raising the decal in triumph. "Hey, Jeannie, how come you never ask me how I slept?"
"Because you –" she laughed, rumpling his hair and planting a kiss on the crown of his head, "are never in a bad mood." She raised an eyebrow at Warren, said, "Tell Hank I'm out back," and jogged out of the room.
"See!" said Warren, when he was sure the others were out of earshot. "People are acting very strange around here!"
"Just you," said Bobby. "I've got Cocoa Puffs hidden in my room. Want some? Cyke needs to remember some of us are growing boys."
Robert Drake was absolutely hopeless.
Jean had been standing there, bouncing up and down in a jog-bra, and Scott didn't seem fazed in the least.
Something was definitely going on.
*
Warren kept watching them, looking for signs, but there were just more battles, and more workouts, and Scott and Jean kept being themselves – only, if possible, moreso. He was a pain in the ass, and she was a cheerful vision of girl-next-door as red-headed goddess. But if they were anything more than friends and teammates, they didn't give a sign of it.
"The status of their relationship is none of my concern," said Hank, when Warren brought it up. "However, if I held the opinion that it were my concern, I would certainly endeavor to inquire –"
"Yeah yeah." Warren cut him off. Hank always missed the point.
Like most great discoveries, Warren finally made his by accident. It happened on one of the long-weekend "vacations" that the Professor was fond of granting them, which Warren had learned to dread, as they generally ended up with some sort of disaster (flood, fire, robot attack). This time, though, he determined that he would take off for the city, first thing in the morning, spend four decadent days at Candy's place and pretend the phone (or, if the Professor forced him to, his brain) was broken. He announced this plan to the group – everybody knew about him and Candy by now – and the others shared their intentions. Hank and Bobby had a ski weekend planned with Vera and Zelda (or Zelda and Vera; nobody could ever remember including, apparently, the parties involved). Jean and Scott were sharing a 5 AM cab to the train station, so that she could visit her sister up in Dutchess County, while Scott could go to some spectacularly dull-sounding automotive history museum in Vermont. It all sounded so much like them that Warren forgot to be suspicious.
Warren's own early-rising intentions were foiled when he slept through his alarm – willfully, covering his head against the sun, figuring Candy wouldn't be up yet anyway, and they still had plenty of weekend ahead of them. So he rolled over a few dozen times before realizing it was well past noon, and a little early in the relationship to presume on her patience too much. So he threw some things into an overnight bag, called her answering machine to leave a manufactured excuse about ten-foot robots, and was getting into his car when he remembered her Velvet Underground record. He had borrowed her copy of "White Light/White Heat," and subsequently passed it on to Scott in an attempt (Warren claimed) make him cooler (actually because Warren didn't care, didn't get it, kind of thought Lou Reed was a ripoff of Bob Dylan, who he didn't like much in the first place, and wasn't about to say any of that to a woman who believed oral sex was the best kind of alarm clock, and put this belief into practice. Warren never overslept when he stayed with Candy).
Scott, Warren assumed, would be gone. He wasn't the kind of guy to sleep through his own plans. Scott probably planned 5 AM cab rides when he didn't need to, just for the hell of it. So Warren really didn't have any reason not to sprint up the stairs and burst through the door of Scott's room without knocking, running so fast that his feet skidded on the bare floor and he put out his wings to brace himself before he smacked into the wall --.
And Jean screamed.
And Scott yelled. "WARREN WORTHINGTON, YOU GODDAMN FUCKING IDIOT WHAT THE HELL – "
Warren turned around and, by the time he could take it all in, Jean was kneeling on the floor, gathering some items she seemed to have spilled. Scott was in bed, hand on his battle visor, looking like he was ready to jump out and throttle Warren – except that he obviously wasn't going to get out of bed. Because he wasn't wearing a shirt and he was covered from the chest down with a sheet.
Suddenly, Warren was not thinking about Lou Reed.
"My," Warren said. "My my my. This is a very interesting situation." He didn't think people's skin actually turned red. Well, the Professor's did sometimes. But not ice-water-vein Scott Summers. Warren wasn't sure whether the guy was angry or embarrassed. But he was definitely red.
"You made me spill my nail polish!" Jean got to her feet, holding the bottle out to Warren with a pout on her face. She was wearing slippers and a very short nightdress that just barely covered her ass (and while she moved to stand, for a second, it didn't even do that). She looked from the fuming Scott to the smirking Warren, announced, "Three's a crowd," and took a step toward the door.
"No!" Scott protested. Then, "Yes! You!" He pointed at Warren, then the door. "Get out! And then don't move! Because as soon as I put some clothes on, I'm going to kill you!"
"Uh uh," said Jean. "You two need to have a talk. In fact, you've needed to have this talk for a while." She reached out to tousle Scott's hair, then leaned down and kissed his forehead. "But call me when you're done." She winked at Warren. "I like it when he gets that tone in his voice."
They watched the way her hips moved as she walked out the door.
As soon as the latch clicked shut, they both started yelling at once. "You never heard of knocking?" "You weren't supposed to be here!" "You weren't supposed to be here!" "Who are you going to believe, me or you?" "What are you doing in my room if I'm not here?" "What were you going to do if I did knock?"
They both ran out of breath before they had any answers. Warren took the time to reflect that, in situations such as these, the fully clothed party had a certain advantage. (Unless you counted the advantage the unclothed party got from the massive concussive force beams behind his eyes. But Warren was pretty sure Scott wouldn't do that. The last time was almost certainly an accident). So Warren crossed his arms and said, "So – you and Jean?"
"No!" Scott answered reflexively. Then he glanced down at the streak of spilled nail polish on his floor. "All right, yes. Obviously. But it hasn't been going on that long."
"Only since, oh – the night of Bobby's birthday party?"
"Dammit –" Scott pounded his fist against the mattress. "Hank told you!"
"Wait," Warren demanded. "You told Hank?"
At the same time, they said, "No!"
Warren took a little longer to breathe and Scott said, "Hank figured it out almost right away. He was too polite to say anything, but Jean could tell he knew."
"That lying bastard," Warren mumbled. Then, "All of you! All three of you are lying bastards. How could you –" His eyes stopped at the nail polish on the floor. Something was not quite right about that –
"We didn't lie," said Scott. "We just didn't see the point of announcing it."
Warren stepped closer. "Jean obviously wanted you to tell me."
"All right, fine." Scott let out a deep breath. "I didn't want to tell everyone. Not right away. There was no way to know how things would go and – well, this team is too important to get screwed up because of my personal life."
"Right. Naturally. You don't have to explain." Warren was looking at the bed now. He remembered the way Jean rubbed her hand in Scott's hair, which a girl with a fresh manicure just wouldn't do. He noted that the other boy was still lying on his side, propped up on his elbow, when it would have been more natural and more comfortable to sit up and put his feet on the floor. Jean had been wearing slippers.
Warren darted his hand forward and pulled up the end of the bedclothes, exposing Scott's feet. "Now that you have to explain."
Scott's face turned red again. But it wasn't nearly as red as the brilliant color on – hmm, approximately half of his toenails. "How," he mumbled, covering his face. "Can I possibly explain that?" But now, at least, he could sit up. He pulled the sheet and blanket over his lap and set his feet on the floor. Warren took that as enough of a signal to sit on the bed beside him -- leaving a reasonable space between them, of course. "She said she thought it would be cute." Scott shrugged. "She was laughing a lot."
"And you weren't going to say 'no,' considering you just got your first blow job. . ."
"It wasn't --!" Scott began, but he caught himself before Warren could figure out whether he meant that wasn't what they were doing, or it wasn't the first. "So, yeah, okay, I'm whipped. I know that's what you're thinking."
"That's not even remotely what I'm thinking," Warren answered. "I'm thinking you're lucky."
Scott covered his head and leaned down. "That crossed my mind, too."
"You're a lucky son-of-a-bitch," said Warren, "who has a lot of X-men to answer to if he fucks this up."
Warren could see Scott's jaw clench. "Don't sit there and tell me –" Then his voice trailed off and with a sheepish grin, he said, "Listen to me, defending my constitutional right to fuck up my life."
"But not Jean's."
"No," Scott shook his head, and – Warren always wondered how Scott managed to let you know when he was looking straight in your eyes, but he did. "I would never do that, Warren."
And that's the thing about the damn Boy Scout in Scott Summers. Sometimes he was so earnest that you wanted to laugh, but because he was so earnest, you just couldn't. So Warren slapped his friend on the back and said, "Congratulations. I'm serious." A shy smile slipped over Scott's face, and Warren, who didn't want the moment to get too heavy or anything, kicked the toe of his loafer against Scott's bare foot. "That stuff doesn't just come off, you know. You need special chemicals."
"I do?" Scott's voice almost cracked over the question, like he was suddenly thirteen years old instead of twenty. "Where do I get special chemicals?"
"Don't sweat it." Warren got to his feet and walked over to the shelf with Scott's few records, where he retrieved Candy's album. "Jeannie will have them. And I'm sure she'll give you some, once she's good and ready."
Scott groaned. "I guess this is some kind of lesson."
Warren smiled, and turned to see the other boy's sheepish half smile. And he wouldn't have the nerve to ask, except that Scott seemed like such a kid right then, in spite of the visor -- bed linens in his lap and hair in his face, just a bit lost and scared and bewildered by his luck. "So," Warren said, "How is it?"
Scott face stayed blank for a moment, and if he wanted to, he could pretend to think that Warren meant the lesson, or the record, or having embarrassing things done to his feet just to see if he would sit still long enough. But then he smiled and looked at Warren and said, "It's her, you know? It's just Jean."
"Yeah," Warren agreed. "It sure as hell is."